Opening day of the 100th Manitoba Men’s Curling Championship, the 2025 Viterra Championship at Stride Place, Portage la Prairie, like most opening days went mainly according to the form chart as determined by the pre-event seeding by the teams.
The opening draws pit the top seeded teams, the favorites to win the championship, against the lower seeded teams, often teams with little or no experience playing in championship arena ice conditions which are significantly different from the club ice conditions they normally play. It is unlikely in the first games for the top eight seeds that there will be an upset win by the lower-ranked teams.
When the Carberry team skipped by Rob Van Kommer, with Ed Barr throwing fourth, went on the ice at noon Wednesday against #6 seed Riley Smith and his East St. Paul team, the betting odds would have favoured the Smith foursome. Authoring the first upset of the week, Barr hit for three on the ninth to go three up and then made a double kill with his last coming home for an 8-5 win.
Top-seeded Reid Carruthers and his Granite team, along with the other six among the top eight seeds, won by concession before the full ten ends were complete.
At the end of the competitive spectrum, the 32-team draw format dictates that four games on the late draw of opening day will see the first four eliminations from the “B” side of the double-knock-out opening round.
A disappointing second loss ended the Smith foursome’s short stay at the championship. Marcus Titchkosky and his young Morden team stole two on the ninth end in their late draw game with the Smith team then stole again to eliminate them 9-6. Robin Nelson (Granite), Travis Gregory (Hamiota), and Grant Brown (Burntwood) were the other first day two-loss eliminations.
The 2025 Viterra Championship opened with a Reunion of Champions celebration banquet Tuesday evening with 43 champions from across the four Men’s Championship sponsorship eras on attendance sharing stories of their glory days with today’s young competitors.
British Consols champion Dave Romano, a 1972 World champion, was joined by six other champions from the 1970’s; 1981 Labatt Tankard champion Kerry Burtnyk, whose five Manitoba titles also included 1995 when he won the first Safeway Select enroute to a world title, headlined the 18 Labatt and 16 Safeway champions in attendance; and the six past Viterra champions in attendance included Reid Carruthers, Derek Samagalski, and Connor Njegovan who are competing this week in Portage. Safeway champions Bob Scales (2003 with John Bubbs) and Greg Melnichuk (2005)
